Dr. Heejin Cho

Research Interests: Cellular and functional maturation of human neural circuits

Heejin Cho received her B.S. in Life Sciences from UNIST in 2016 and her Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from KAIST in 2022 under the mentorship of Dr. Eunjoon Kim. During her Ph.D., she investigated synaptic dysfunction in mouse models of autism spectrum disorder and found that ADNP-haploinsufficiency leads to deficits in synaptic plasticity, identifying CaMKIIα hyperactivity as a candidate disease mechanism. She later joined Dr. Baljit Khakh’s laboratory at UCLA, where she studied astrocyte maturation during mouse brain development. In the Bhaduri Lab, Heejin is interested in understanding how human neural circuits mature at the cellular and functional levels during development. She combines organoid models with single-cell RNA sequencing, calcium imaging, and electrophysiological approaches to study the emergence of circuit activity and the cellular mechanisms that shape developing human brain networks. Outside of the lab, Heejin enjoys watching baseball and playing golf.